UK government “failed” Equitable Life policyholders

The UK failed to comply with EC insurance directives and the government should compensate thousands of policyholders that suffered financial loss as a result of the events at Equitable Life, concludes a damning European Parliament report into the near-collapse of the company in 2000. A committee of inquiry set up at the beginning of last year to investigate the UK’s implementation of EC insurance directives and the Commission’s monitoring of the UK’s compliance with its rules has published its draft report which makes a series of recommendations for the regulation of insurance and how to right the alleged regulatory failings in the 1990s that it says form a direct link with the financial loss of Equitable Life policyholders.